Banks plan to hoard bitcoins to pay cyber ransoms

[skierchewing]

Who knows, maybe the reason of the recent price increase ? They surely bought a few millions worth of bitcoins, so probable for me.

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[2double0]

So, banks are taking interest in Bitcoins by doing this, right?
Is that the reason why we are seeing spikes in the price currently?
I thought this before that some seriously big institution must be buying it with such high volumes currently.

[calkob]

Thats fine they are holding like the rest of us, and the whole hacks things is prob just an excuse so it dosnt look like they are storing up bitcoin.

[funkenstein]

Your deposits are safe!  Really.  We're just, you know, getting a few coins, like in case of cryptolocker emergency.  Yeah. 

[LoyceV]

Several of London’s largest banks are looking to stockpile bitcoins in order to pay off cyber criminals who threaten to bring down their critical IT systems.

Why would they need to "stockpile" Bitcoins? They're banks, they can just buy them at an exchange the moment they need them. Unless they just want some "criminal press" for Bitcoin.

some banks were coming round to the view that it was cheaper to pay off the criminals than risk an attack.

It's like negotiating with terrorists: the moment you do it, you're getting more attacks.

Do we have any confirmed information that some bank actually paid the ransom already?

That's like having a big sign: Extort me!

Much easier to hire technicians who know a thing or two about security and have them full time than hoarding Bitcoin

It's not just "some" technicians, banks have hundreds of IT-people on the payroll. I recently read (and can't find the link back) that Dutch bank ING is going to invest 800 million euro in its IT infrastructure. On a budget like that, keeping a few Bitcoin to stop a script kiddie with his DDOS could be a cheap short-term fix.

[Wind_FURY]

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/oct/22/city-banks-plan-to-hoard-bitcoins-to-help-them-pay-cyber-ransoms

Several of London’s largest banks are looking to stockpile bitcoins in order to pay off cyber criminals who threaten to bring down their critical IT systems.

The virtual currency, which is highly prized by criminal networks because it cannot be traced, is being acquired by blue chip companies in order to pay ransoms, according to a leading IT expert.

On Friday, hackers attacked the websites of a number of leading online companies including Twitter, Spotify and Reddit. They used a special code to harness the power of hundreds of thousands of internet-connected home devices, such as CCTV cameras and printers, to launch “distributed denial of service” (DDoS) attacks through a US company called Dyn, which provides directory services to online companies. DDoS attacks involve inundating computer servers with so much data traffic that they cannot cope.

There is no evidence that Dyn was the subject of extortion demands but it has become apparent that hackers have been using the code to threaten other businesses into paying them with bitcoins or risk becoming the target of similar attacks.

Dr Simon Moores, a former technology ambassador for the UK government and chair of the annual international e-Crime Congress, the global body that brings together IT professionals, said the scale and ferocity of the attacks meant some banks were coming round to the view that it was cheaper to pay off the criminals than risk an attack.

I do not believe any of that press release. Banks are smart. They will not hoard something unless they see that it can generate some profit for themselves. Do you actually believe they are buying Bitcoins to pay off malware attacks? They are buying because it is on the way up and fiat currencies are starting to go down. The article mentioned that several London banks are doing the buying. Why? Because GBP is going down so they need BTC to hedge.

 

[tbterryboy]

https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/oct/22/city-banks-plan-to-hoard-bitcoins-to-help-them-pay-cyber-ransoms

Several of London’s largest banks are looking to stockpile bitcoins in order to pay off cyber criminals who threaten to bring down their critical IT systems.

The virtual currency, which is highly prized by criminal networks because it cannot be traced, is being acquired by blue chip companies in order to pay ransoms, according to a leading IT expert.

On Friday, hackers attacked the websites of a number of leading online companies including Twitter, Spotify and Reddit. They used a special code to harness the power of hundreds of thousands of internet-connected home devices, such as CCTV cameras and printers, to launch “distributed denial of service” (DDoS) attacks through a US company called Dyn, which provides directory services to online companies. DDoS attacks involve inundating computer servers with so much data traffic that they cannot cope.

There is no evidence that Dyn was the subject of extortion demands but it has become apparent that hackers have been using the code to threaten other businesses into paying them with bitcoins or risk becoming the target of similar attacks.

Dr Simon Moores, a former technology ambassador for the UK government and chair of the annual international e-Crime Congress, the global body that brings together IT professionals, said the scale and ferocity of the attacks meant some banks were coming round to the view that it was cheaper to pay off the criminals than risk an attack.

The banks may continue to act in a nonsense and outrageous manner,no matter what attempt they make is going to be futile because there is no way they can bring down bitcoin, bitcoin far more power than all banks put together. Let them continue fooling themselves.

[shield132]

Oh it will be unjustice if they hoard bitcoin, I think bank's mustn't do that and I don't believe that and it's difficult to believe that banks are going to to pay ransom. I hope that there is no way they can to bring down bitcoin.

Do we have any confirmed information that some bank actually paid the ransom already?

There isn't any similar information in internet, so they don't have paid ransom.
And it's old news and why is it published renewly now?

[JeffBrad12]

this is all old news from atleast 6 months ago

the news paper article is resurrecting old news and written to confuse the matter
they mention one bunch of hackers/script kiddies that do DDoS attacks and another group of hackers/script kiddies who throw ransomware at employee's who use their work pc's to look at dodgy sites and download dodgy things.

many banks have been informed by security advisors months ago that it might be worth keeping a stash of bitcoin in the event that the second scenario happens. but this still does not mean the banks will do this. its just a recommendation from security analysts as a precaution.. and an old recommendation at that.

it seems due to the bitcoin price moving forward, some people thing they should use this as a way to push the price forward more by showing why everyone should buy buy buy, via news articles 'reporting' that some whales are soon gonna buy..
though the reality is the news articles are about 6 months behind the story they are resurrecting

   
And totally this just a jokes, okay. I just think theguardian are less for the another fresh news for putting on their site. 

[Juggy777]

I don't believe this. If the banks succumb to such tactics then every small and big hacker will start to haunt them. This is so stupid, like banks telling hackers listen come hack us we have kept your ransom money 💵 in advance. You know where to hack us and ask for it. Seriously why would anyone believe in it.

[The Sceptical Chymist]

I find it difficult to believe that banks are preparing to pay a ransom, but I know that banks invest in many fields. Properties, shares, bonds, so it's not surprising at all they're buying a few BTC.

This was my thought, too.  Banks could swallow up all the bitcoin in the world, easily, if they were buying.  I suspect that if this is all true, they're buying in fairly small amounts.  OTOH, the price spike we've seen since before the halvening...the banks might very well have something to do with that if they're preparing to pay ransoms.  Stranger things have happened in this crazy-ass world.

[JeffBrad12]

I don't believe this. If the banks succumb to such tactics then every small and big hacker will start to haunt them. This is so stupid, like banks telling hackers listen come hack us we have kept your ransom money 💵 in advance. You know where to hack us and ask for it. Seriously why would anyone believe in it.

Maybe they have their own very reason for saying that. It is not usually they are inviting hackers to hack them but it is telling a caution to hackers that they have bounty already for their bad things that they are doing. And they will going to announce this if they don't know what they are doing, I think they have something hiding with this.

This about 6 month ago and i think a recent updates about this news are already there, and the another things are all of that just a rumors and i don't see the another things relating into that news in this day.

[bitbunnny]

Knowing how banks are thinking and acting it is not very likely that they would collect Bitcoins to pay for ransome. They have similar attitude towards hackers like some states towards terrorists - no negotiations and no payments.
But banks are buying Bitcoins for different reasons because they saw the big chance for profit and they will not miss it. They can't resist the profit when the see it.

[BADecker]

Hoarding will not stop its use. They can't hoard it all. The price will only rise from hoarding. There will be too much temptation for bank employees and managers to use it when Bitcoin is a $10,000,000 per bitcoin.

[mastica]

Looks like that bitcoin is being introduced into the banks as they say to pay hackers to avoid their attacks, the banks should had done already something about their system. They know their system has several issues around it and the hackers are exploiting it while bitcoin is growing.

[Snorek]

What's disturbing is not that banks prepare for disaster. It's disturbing that they do it via buying Bitcoin, not by strengthening their system security.

They know that their current centralized technology and data centers based is the end of the road here. Cyber attacks, hacking and ransowamre is not gonna stop.
It is gonna increase over time. They desperately want to keep status quo and current system, therefore paying ransom money (or bitcoins in this case) is still the best solution for them.

[mastica]

The bank system has several issues, even investing into IT deeply they wont be able to protect all the accounts they hold, banks should think about protect their clients like bitcoin with hash, maybe with private pools and limited acess they could stop let hackers take advantage, i do know and read histories that some hackers steal 0,01dollars from each account and some of them reach fast 1 milion, but their greedy makes them go to jail.

[rajasumi3]

Well when banks dont want to spend their money on their own thats y they are using bitcoin .acc to me there should not be any banks at all , there should be more buying and selling bitcoins .so that people dont have to suffer.

[Mometaskers]

They can always exchange the money they have for bitcoins to pay ransom when their system do get compromised. I feel like they're trying to get into bitcoin because they saw how well it's doing. They already placed money in various investments, so why not bitcoin?